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Thomas Jefferson 



AN ADDRESS BEFORE THE 



Iroquois Club 



APRIX. 13th, 1901 

By S. S. GREGORY 

OF CHICACJO 



THOMAS JEFFERSON 

AN ADDRESS BEFORE THE 

IROQUOIS CLUB 

April r^, 1901 



BY S. S. GREGORY, OF CHICAGO 



Mr. President and Gentlemen: 

We have recently celebrated the centennial anniversary 
of Thomas Jefferson's first inauguration. 

That event may be not inappropriately taken as the be- 
ginning of that great party with which we are identified — 
a party, the dissolution of which, has been repeatedly 
prophesied by enemies and feared by its friends; but which, 
vitalized by those eternal principles of truth, of justice and 
of popular liberty with which the name and fame of its 
founder are inseparably associated, still survives, undaunted 
by defeat, assured in a glorious past, hopeful and confident 
of a useful and splendid future. 

It is not necessary on this occasion to rehearse the famil- 
iar story of Jefferson's life. Born with many advantages, 
he acquired a liberal education, being not merely deeply 
versed in mathematics and the sciences, but a profound stu- 
dent of the classics as well, and proficient in several modern 
languages. Having acquired a legal education he entered 
upon the practice of the law with great diligence and assi- 



duity, and although but little gifted as a speaker, met with 
great success in this exacting profession. 

But if it be true that John Marshall was born to be the 
Chief Justice of any nation of which he was a citizen, 
Thomas Jefferson was not less inevitably predestined to be 
the great lawgiver and legislator of any land which claimed 
him as her son. His was one of those rare minds that can 
not only evolve and proclaim in perspicuous, attractive and 
convincing form the general and fundamental principles of 
free government, but can also elaborate these ideas in the 
concrete form of positive legislation. 

He was the great apostle of American liberty and of 
popular government. At the age of 33 he penned the im- 
mortal Declaration; and there laid down the principles of 
government which always controlled his public conduct — 
for unlike some modern statesmen he did not avow generous 
and benevolent sentiments only to ruthlessly disregard 
them in official conduct. At the age of 26 he introduced 
into the House of Burgesses of Virginia, a bill giving slave 
owners a right, not before possessed, to manumit their slaves 
— though then defeated it was passed in 1782. 

In 1776 he brought in a bill to abolish all entails in Vir- 
ginia, which was carried. As one of the revisers of the 
statutes of that State, he secured, in 1777, the abolition of 
all rights of primogeniture; thus, by these two measures, 
abolishing those unjust and distinctive features of the aris- 
tocratical and feudal system of land tenures which had 
obtained in England. 

He labored manfully for separation of church and State 
and the complete establishment of religious freedom, and 
drew the bill upon that subject, which, with minor changes, 
was finally adopted in 1786. 



He prepared a bill for free common schools, aud one for 
the prompt naturalization of foreigners, which a hostile 
biographer declares, was too Democratic. The latter was 
carried, but the former, though excellent, accurate and 
comprehensive, was never fully adopted. 

He ameliorated the criminal code securing the abolition 
of capital punishment for all crimes, save treason and 
murder. 

He was the first great emancipator; when acting as re- 
viser of the laws of his State, he advocated legislation, 
securing the freedom of all born in slavery after a certain 
day, and also providing for their deportation. Writing on 
this subject subsequently^ he says, with remarkable pre- 
science: "Nothing is more certainly written in the book 
of fate than that these people are to be free; nor is it less 
certain that the two races, equally free, can not live in the 
same government." 

In 1779, while Governor of Virginia, he took formal pos- 
session of the Western territory claimed by that State, in- 
cluding the territory west from the south line of Virginia 
to the Mississippi. This embraces the Northwest territory 
ceded by Virginia to the Nation March 1, 1784, including 
the present States of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wis- 
consin and a part of Minnesota. 

In 1784 he drew the report of a committee of Congress 
for a plan of temporary government for the Western terri- 
tory. Mr. Webster tells us that Nathan Dane was the au- 
thor of the celebrated, ordinance of 1787 for the government 
of the Northwest territory. However this may be, this re- 
port by Mr. Jefferson was the original of that ordinance. 
In it, after providing for the creation of States out of this 
territory, was this provision : " That after the year 1800 of 



the Christian era there shall be neither slavery nor invol- 
untar,y servitude in any of the said States, otherwise than 
in punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been 
duly convicted to have been personally guilty." This clause 
then failed of adoption because a majority of the States did 
not vote for it; but it is found almost literally in Section 6 
of the famous ordinance of 1787 already referred to. 

Some of Jefferson's petty critics seem to have been almost 
as much impressed with the rather fantastic nomenclature 
suggested by him in respect of the States thus contemplated, 
as with this noble and statesmanlike provision in favor of 
human liberty. 

T6 this one clause more than to auv other single thing, 
we owe the fact that this did not become a slave-holding 
nation. That a public man from Virginia, the stronghold 
of slavery, himself an owner of slaves, should have imposed 
such a bar to that institution in this imperial domain, 
singles him out as one of those rare spirits, who, rising 
above the trammels of place and time, can grasp eternal 
truth and, with commanding view, survey the mighty per- 
spective of a nation's future. 

T pause with this brief and wholly inadequate review of 
his career as a lawgiver, to comment upon the astounding 
fact that he has been continually held up to view by a large 
class of apparently otherwise intelligent thinkers, speakers 
and writers as an erratic political visionary on whom they 
have derisively bestowed the appellation, philosopher. That 
all of the generous and noble visions, cherished in his warm 
and benevolent heart for the welfare of his country and 
his kind, were not realized, is too true. That sometimes he 
advocated them in a manner that seemed extravagant, may 
perhaps, be conceded. But what American statesman of the 



most practical and sordid school can be suggested, who 
accomplished a respectable fraction of what this great man 
achieved in the domain of practical legislation and admin- 
istration? The proudest and greatest achievements of such 
as these shrivel and wither into insignificance in compari- 
son. There is but one American statesman whom 1 would 
class with him in this regard, that great, humane, liberty- 
loving son of Illinois, and, in lineage, of Virginia as well, 
Abraham Lincoln. 

Jefferson, with that practical talent which his detractors 
deny, but which was one of his most marked characteristics, 
reduced the rules of parliamentary procedure to a system, 
and wrote a treatise on parliamentary law "w4iich has been 
the standard authority on the subject since. 

He secured the adoption of the dollar as the unit of value, 
proposing a gold piece of $10, a silver dollar, a silver tenth 
of a dollar and a copper hundredth of a dollar. This sys- 
tem was adopted and with some additions, we still retain it. 

He urged freedom of commerce in a report to Congress 
on Commerce in 1793, while he was Secretary of State, in 
these sensible words: " Instead of embarrassing commerce 
under piles of regulating laws, duties and prohibitions, 
could it be relieved of all its shackles in all parts of the 
world; could every country be employed in producing 
that which nature has best fitted it to produce, and each be 
free to exchange with others, mutual surpluses for mutual 
wants, the greatest mass possible would then be produced 
of those things which contribute to human life and human 
happiness." 

It is not difficult to imagine what would be the policy of 
such a man toward those of foreign birth who should seek 
in this land that liberty and opportunity which they could 



6 

not elsewhere find; indeed, it was under his inspiration that 
the great Democratic party adopted that policy in State and 
Federal legislation which has made this land, in the sneer- 
ing phrase of our opponents, " an asylum for the oppressed 
of all nations." 

Shortly after his first inauguration, in response to an 
address from the foreign born residents of Beaver county, 
Pennsylvania, he said: 

" Born in other countries, yet believing you could be 
happy in this, our laws acknowledge, as they should do, 
your right to join us in society, conforming, as I doubt not, 
you will do, to our established rules. That these rules 
shall be as equal as prudential considerations will admit, 
will certainly be the aim of our legislatures, general and 
particular. To unequal privileges among members of the 
same society the spirit of our nation is with one accord 
averse." 

In his first annual message he recommended a change 
in the laws adopted during Mr. Adams' administration pre- 
scribing a residence of fourteen years before an alien could 
become a citizen. 1 suppose this was one of those great 
acts of constructive statesmanship for which Mr. Hamil- 
ton's admirers accord him credit. It was there he used the 
expression, "Shall oppressed humanity find no asylum on 
this globe?" and recommended that citizenship be extended 
under proper restrictions, to every one manifesting a bona 
fide purpose of residing here permanently. 

Under his influence at the first session of Congress during 
his first administration, Congress secured the right of 
press reporters on the floor of both houses. True to their 
unrepublican instincts, the Federalists opposed this. It 
seems, perhaps, an unimportant incident; yet it is not so. 



On the contrary, it is vital that every act of our public 
servants should be performed under the public eye. And 
the right of the press representatives to attend upon Con- 
gress is essential to secure this end. Prior to the action 
referred to, reporters were admitted only on sufferance, and 
the Speaker of the House had expelled two for reporting 
speeches too literally, among these being one of his own. 

We now hear much of the Monroe doctrine. No one 
would wish to deprive James* Monroe, that true Democrat 
and sterling patriot, of any of his just laurels; yet it is a 
fact that on October 29, 1808, during his second administra- 
tion, Mr. Jefferson wrote the Governor of Louisiana, as fol- 
lows : " The patriots of Spain have no warmer friends 
than the administration of the United States, but it is our 
duty to say nothing and to do nothing for or against either. 
If they succeed we shall be well satisfied to see Cuba and 
Mexico remain in their present dependence; but very un- 
willing to see them in that of either France or England, 
politically or commercially. We consider their interests 
and ours as the same, and that the object of both must be to 
exclude all European interference from this hemisphere.' ' 

The Monroe doctrine in all its extent is fully set forth in 
a letter from Mr. Jefferson to Mr. Monroe while the latter 
was President, dated October 24, 1828. 
In that letter he used this memorable language : 
" Our first and fundamental maxim should be never to 
entangle ourselves in the broils of Europe. Our second, 
never to suffer Europe to intermeddle with cisatlantic 
affairs." 

The Monroe doctrine was formally promulgated by the 
President in his message to Congress of December 2nd, 
following. 



8 

I have uot deemed it advisable to enter, in any detail, 
upon the story of Jefiferson's labors in behalf of American 
liberty and independence prior to the Revolution. Suffice 
it to say that he was one of the first, if not the first, to de- 
clare that the English Parliament had no right to govern 
the colonies. 

In 1774 he proposed certain instructions to the delegates 
to be sent from Virginia to the Continental Congress. These 
were republished in England and, dealing with the whole 
question of the relations of the colonies to that country, 
were so radical that Mr. Jefierson's name was included in 
a bill of attainder proposed in Parliament, but afterward 
abandoned. 

He supported Patrick Henry resolutely, and consistently 
insisted upon independence, with separation as an unsought 
alternative. 

Jefferson had no part in framing the Constitution. He 
criticised it mildly for not making the President ineligible 
to re-election and as lacking a Bill of Rights. The latter 
was at once supplied by the first ten amendments, and 
he then gave it his cordial support. But while he was 
not concerned in framing the organic law of the nation ^ 
that finds its basis in those principles of freedom and lib- 
erty with which his writings, more than those of any other 
one person, had inspired the hearts and minds of the col- 
onists. 

I will make no attempt to further deal with the record of his 
administrative career, either as Governor of Virginia, Secre- 
tary of State, or President. But as an illustration of those 
qualities of practical statesmanship which his detractors find 
so essentially wanting, the Louisiana purchase is instructive. 
By this acquisition we gained, b};^ treat\% with France, the 



9 

territory now included in Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, 
Iowa, the Dakotas, Montana, the greater part of Min- 
nesota, Nebraska, Indian Territory, nearly all of Kan- 
sas, and parts of Wyoming, Colorado, and, I think, Idaho. 
He doubted the constitutional power to acquire this 
mighty empire, but his strong practical sense led him to 
subordinate these doubts in view of the tremendous import- 
ance of this acquisition. In fact, he was wrong in his 
theory, but sound in his practical course; and wonder- 
fully has the nation grown and profited by it. It is an 
event worthy of the great national celebration to be held in 
our sister city of St. Louis; and this commemoration will 
arouse the present generation to some due appreciation of 
this'great incident in our national history, and doubtless 
inspire a renewed interest in the life and character of the 
great statesman under whose administration this vast em- 
pire was acquired. 

Mr. Jefferson was the founder of the University of Vir- 
ginia, one of the great seats of learning in our land; and 
he was always the friend and patron of learning and the 
liberal arts. 

I have thus, after most meager fashion, briefly sketched 
some of the achievements which justify the high place ac- 
corded to this great man in the history of mankind, by 
those at least of his own political faith. Perhaps something 
ma}- be added upon his character and general views. 

That which must first impress every intelligent student 
of his life, is his ardent devotion to liberty; liberty of 
thought, of speech, of action, of trade. 

When he was first elected, soon after the notorious and ty- 
rannical alien and sedition laws, a part of Hamilton's great 
constructive system to which the latter seemed especially 



10 

attached, the universal popular acclaim was " For Jefferson 
and Liberty." 

In a letter to Mr. Stuart of Virginia, dated December 23, 
1791, on the expediency of framing a new constitution for 
the State, he said: " I would rather be exposed to the in- 
conveniences attending too much liberty, than those attend- 
ing too small a degree of it." This was his rule of public 
and practical conduct all through life. 

Closely related to it was his confidence and trust in the 
people and in their capacity for self government, a matter 
in which he differed most radically from his great con- 
temporary and political antagonist, Alexander Hamilton. 
Fortunate indeed is it for the American people and the 
cause of civil liberty, that his views prevailed and not those 
of Hamilton who, 1 digress to observe, never believed in 
universal suff"rage, and while constant in praise of the 
British constitution, was sedulous against those liberalizing 
influences, which in that empire have transformed its 
government into a form far more popular, at the present 
time, than we have any reason to suppose Hamilton had 
any faith or confidence in. 

A biographer, by no means partial, says of Jefferson that 
he "was the true friend of the commonalty. While he 
regarded their welfare as the noblest object of government, 
be did not confer benefits upon them as boons, like a politi- 
cal charity done by superiors to inferiors. He believed in 
them; he esteemed their intelligence; he not only respected 
their power, but he desired to see them use it, because he 
was firmly convinced that they would use it well." 

It is interesting to compare Hamilton's view, stated in his 
own language: "Nothing is more fallacious than to ex- 
pect to produce any valuable or permanent results in polit- 



11 

ical projects by relying merely on the reason of men. Men 
are rather reasoning than reasonable animals, for the most 
part governed by the impulse of passion." 

I can not refrain in this connection from quoting a few- 
sentences from .Jefferson's first inaugural: 

" Sometimes it is said that man can not be trusted with 
the government of himself. Can he then be trusted with 
the government of others? Or, have we found angels in the 
forms of Kings to govern hipi? Let history answer this 
question." 

I will refer in the third place to but one further trait of 
this great man's character; his spotless integrity, both per- 
sonal and political. He once said: "The great principles 
of right and wrong are legible to every reader; to pursue 
them requires not the aid of many counsellors. The whole 
art of government consists in the art of being honest." 

On the 18th of March, 1797, writing to an unnamed cor- 
respondent, he says: " When I first entered on the stage 
of public life (now twenty-four years ago), I came to a resolu- 
tion never to engage in any kind of enterprise for the 
improvement of my fortune, nor to wear any othSr character 
than that of a farmer." 

This indeed, is astounding doctrine, and must seem quite 
revolutionary to Senators of the United States whose opera- 
tions on Wall street and elsewhere, based on " inside 
information " derived from their official positions, or from 
persons who desire to stand well with them, are said to be 
extensive and sometimes not unprofitable. It would be 
interesting to have an expression from Mr. Hanna on this 
subject. 

In a letter of September 9, 1792, to Washington, refer- 
ring to Hamilton's influence on Congress, he said: 



12 

"I saw the influence actually produced, and its first 
fruits to be the establishnient of the great outlines of his pro- 
ject by the votes of the very persons who, having swallowed 
his bait, were laying themselves out to profit by his plans; 
and that had these persons withdrawn, as those interested in 
a question ever should, the vote of the disinterested majority 
was clearly the reverse of what they made it." 

Here again we have what seems like novel doctrine. 
There are many Senators of the United States under salar}' 
from large interests. Take for instance Mr. Depew, Chair- 
man of the Board of Directors of the New York Central Rail- 
way Company, and Senator from the State of New York; 
when some question is pending in the Senate affecting rail- 
way interests, can be be expected to act impartially and 
solely from a due regard to the public welfare? There are 
numerous similar instances; yet no one has ever heard of 
one of these gentlemen asking to be excused from voting on 
the ground that he did not occupy such an attitude as per- 
mitted him to act with absolute impartiality. 

Well would it be for the Republic could we return to the 
practice of these simple, honest, Jeffersonian principles. 

The time is ripe for such a political revival. The tradi- 
tions of the Republic are threatened. Under pretext of 
making this nation a world power, the party in power seems 
to contemplate an extensive colonial system, by which we 
shall assume to govern by the exercise of arbitrary power, 
millions of people without their consent. I denounce this 
attempt as unconstitutional, un-American and undemo- 
cratic. There is no room in our system for arbitrary power. 
It degrades and debases at once him who wields it and him 
who feels its burden. We can not, nay we ought not, to en- 
dure half slave and half free. 



13 

And what further? We see upon us a most insane, inor- 
dinate and well nigh universal greed for gain and the rapid 
creation of a plutocratic order of society, which by combi- 
nation, by impudent and, too often, successful demands for 
governmental concession, by every form of exploitation of 
the people, is attaining, per fas aut nefas, a, commercial, 
social and political power which seems to threaten the very 
foundations of civil society. To those in this order, public 
and personal integrity is bufan empty name. That every 
man has his price they firmly believe; and their experience 
largely justifies their belief. They ascribe no honest nor 
creditable motive to him who seeks public office. They re- 
gard no law which they can successfull.y evade, and they 
possess the ability to paralyze the activities of those in public 
authority, on whom we rely to protect our rights. The 
watchmen sleep upon the towers. 

The people must be aroused. Their faithless public serv- 
ants must be cast out. They must assume that active super- 
vision and control over public affairs which they have too 
long abdicated. 

Beyond this first plain question of common honesty, other 
great questions loom up for consideration and determi- 
nation. 

Are the masses of mankind doomed forever to lives of 
the most exacting and unremitting toil, that a few captains 
of industry may accumulate fortunes so colossal as to stagger 
the imagination of men, and a few more live in luxury and 
idleness while their brothers toil and suffer and starve? 

Shall the cry of the poor and the oppressed rise unan- 
swered, save by the mournful and hopeless refrain, "thus it 
hath ever been ? " 



14 

I cau not answer; I can not say when nor how we shall 
inaugurate the political, social and moral regeneration of 
society. 

But this I have to say : 

Thomas Jefferson was a radical, not a conservative. The 
conservatives of his day hated and feared him. He was a 
bold, original and daring thinker. He looked forward and 
not backward. 

We must follow his example. From the inspiration of 
his life and teachings we must gather that spirit of mental 
and moral hardihood which shall enable us to see that 
error, though hoary, is error still; that wrongs entrenched 
in laws, in social usage, in all the orders of the State, are 
yet wrongs. That if past remedies have not proven effica- 
cious, new ones must be sought; and that the only sound 
maxim of government is populi solus, lex suprema. If vested 
rights obstruct, they must yield; if constitutions fetter, they 
must be changed; if social institutions block the way, they 
must be destroyed. 

But I look neither for revolution nor for violence. I 
trust we shall be ruled neither by an emperor, nor a mob. 

For— 

'' I doubt not through the ages 
One unceasing purpose runs, 
And the thoughts of men are widened 
With the process of the suns." 

Thomas JefiPerson sleeps at Monticello, that beautiful 
home 'mid the hills of his dear native State, where all the 
tender affections of his warm heart ever centered. He 
always left it with regret; he hastened to return to it, from 
the highest official station, with unfeigned joy and dehght. 



15 

On his tomb is this inscription dictated by him some time 
before his death : 

Here "was buried 

THOMAS JEFFERSON, 

Author 

of the DECLARATION OF 

AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE 

of 

THE STATUTE OF VIRGINIA, 

FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM and FATHER 

OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA. 

Far distant be the day when the American people shall 
cease to cherish his memory; and may the time never come 
when his influence shall not be a living, vital force in our 
national life. 



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